ShopTalk
by DeBrabant
Summary: SEQUEL TO: Old Friends / Giles meets an odd newcomer to Sunnydale at the majikshop...who wants the same book as him...


ShopTalk  
By Danii  
Summary: While at the majikshop, Giles meets up with a peculiar man who wants the same book he does...  
Disclaimer: I own no one. Not Zachary, Giles, or anyone else in this story. Not even Jeremy!   
Distribution: You actually want this? Sure, just put my name on it and tell me...  
Rating: PG (cause Giles is a little drunk and discusses sex)  
Ships: Canon  
During the summer after season 4  
XOVER: It is with the same movie from "Encounters of the Odd...Kind", "Sunset Consultants", "Curiosity Did What?", "Job Interview With A Vampire", and "Old Friends" which I have already posted: "Love Bites: the Reluctant Vampire"  
NOTE: This is number 6 in the series of encounters with Zachary and his family in which everyone gets to know one of my favorite vampires individually, and nobody tells any of the others about this oddball...This is Giles' part. Then the finale!  
  
NOTE: All previous stories can be found at  
http://fanfiction.net and my site, linked  
  
And now:  
  
  
"Excuse me..."  
  
Hazel eyes met blue green as the two men pulled their hands from the book that both of them had tried to grab a moment before. The apparent older of the two, who wore glasses and was referred to my most of his charges as 'Giles' gave a small smile to the younger. Dear goodness, but that young man looks very much like myself at that age, he though.  
  
"Yes?" the younger-looking man, who was known by most everyone as Zachary Simms, replied in a pleasant tone with a slight English accent.  
  
"Um..." Giles began with a bit of a stammer, "I, well...um...I saw you reaching for that book, and-"  
  
"Yes," Zachary replied before the other could finish, "I need it for a client of mine."  
  
"A client?" the former librarian asked with genuine curiosity.  
  
"Indeed, a client..." Zachary continued, "A client who should be returning tomorrow night...that's why I need the book, you see. Can't really wait for another copy, or I'd let you have it, sir..."  
  
"Quite all right..." Giles answered with a small grin, "I don't have to have it today. I just happened to see it and I though it might interest an acquaintance of mine."  
  
Zachary laughed. "I'd like to meet your acquaintance if she's interested in the newest research on "Runes And Their Place in the Cyber Witch's Home"..."  
  
"And I'd like to meet your client." Giles retorted quickly. While this comment didn't completely kill the light discussion, the next did, "What exactly do you do that would have a client who required this?"  
  
"I'm a consultant..." Zachary answered firmly, pulling out one of his business cards from a pocket of in pants, "Head of Sunset Consultants, which has just moved to Sunnydale, California with my family and myself..."  
  
"Sunset Consultants..." Giles muttered as he looked at the oddly familiar card, "Where have I heard that before?"  
  
"Nowhere, I would think..." the dark-haired vampire said with a small grin, "It wasn't really a public company till I opened yesterday night here in Sunnydale."  
  
"Really..." the Watcher said in a sort of lost voice. He was busy reading the card. "'For the Mundane and Otherwordly'..."  
  
"Indeed..."   
  
Giles gave him an odd look. "What exactly do you know about the 'otherworldly' young man?"  
  
Zachary smiled sweetly (though in the depths of his mind he was cursing about being called a young man), and then plucked the book (which neither of them had actually taken out of the bookshelf) from its place. "A great deal, Mr..."  
  
"Giles." The Watcher filled in for him as he watched the book in the other man's arms, "Rupert Giles. Ex-librarian of Sunnydale High School, and current gentleman of leisure..."  
  
"Simms, sir..." Zachary told the other man as he reached out his hand for a shake, "Zachary Simms. And did you say ex-librarian? I'd think a man as enamored of books as you seem to be wouldn't leave a job like that..."  
  
"Oh, I didn't leave it by choice," Giles replied as he took off his glasses to clean them, "The library was so much rubble after last years...graduation ceremony..."  
  
There was a moment of silence, and then Zachary picked up on what had been left unsaid.   
  
"Oh."  
  
"Indeed..."  
  
"Yeah."  
  
Another bit of silence intruded upon the conversation, but it was quickly broken by Giles, who asked once more, "Now, what were you telling me about the otherworldly, Mr. Simms?"  
  
"Well..." the vampire said slowly, trying to think out what he was going to say before he made a large mistake. Goodness, how did his conversations always get turned into something like this? Did EVERYONE know about the bloody Hellmouth? Couldn't people in this town discuss the weather or something? "I moved here, didn't I?  
  
"Yes, you did."  
  
"And I am aware of what 'here' is...and the kind of...people who frequent it..."  
  
"Ah."  
  
Zachary got a bit aggravated at this point. "Well, what about you, Mr. Giles? What do you know about it?"  
  
"I know," the Watcher said just as slowly as he replaced his glasses, "because I am deeply involved in...it. Especially since my library was on top of...it."  
  
"Really..."  
  
"Yeah."  
  
All right, that was enough of this, thought Zachary. "All right...let's just talk openly, okay? All this tip towing around is getting on my nerves, and considering I'm going to go home to a rather annoying house guest, a bothersome friend, a wife who is probably the only one there who doesn't daily drive me insane, and a son who doesn't want to do his homework, I'd rather not get a headache now...just let me pay for this..."  
  
"Fine." Giles said quickly. He had no problem with that. He was both curious and anxious to find out what the man was, and what he dealt with, not just because of a safety-to-the-Hellmouth reason, but because he wanted to know. Besides, he had a feeling that he'd like this Zachary person once they stopped skirting everything.  
  
Zachary sighed with relief, then walked to the counter and paid for the book that they had both wanted earlier. Then he made his way back to Giles.  
  
"Where would you like to talk?" he asked tiredly.  
  
"The bar a few stores down would be fine for me..." the Watcher answered calmly as he pointed to the aforementioned building. The shorter man nodded.  
  
"Fine."  
  
##  
  
"Oh my, you've got to be kidding!" Zachary cried in amazed mirth, punching into the table as he laughed, "You really got Ris to do that!?"  
  
"Yes, my good man, I did..." Giles said, his head sagging from the alcohol he'd consumed that night. The bar had had a good selection of decent liquor, and the former librarian had tried the majority of it that night.   
  
The two had hit it off well, after the initial unease. They'd started with the Hellmouth, and went on into vampires, Slayers, and finally Watchers, which had led to Rupert's confession of his profession. Or former profession. This had set Zachary into a giggle fit, and then he'd confessed to his own little secret. Rupert had taken it surprisingly well considering the fact that he was a Watcher. Zachary wondered if he knew that young Slayer he'd met before, but didn't ask. He was too busy asking about Nerissa, which much alcohol had revealed to be a former girlfriend of Rupert's. Small world. So that was why he hadn't been surprised about the different vampires.  
  
"And the two of you really made out on the hood of a police car?" Zachary asked again, "After you took her to a..." he got out a giggle, then resumed, "a rock concert?"  
  
"Indeed I did..." Giles proclaimed, "You should try it with your wife some time. Lots of fun..."  
  
"I'm sure..." Zachary agreed with a grin.   
  
"No really..." Rupert told him, "Sets the blood pumping...ah, Joyce..."  
  
The vampire gave him an odd look. "What did you say, old chap?"  
  
"Ah, nothing..." Giles said with a small frown, "You know, Zach old boy..."  
  
"What?"  
  
"Rissa probably only went out with me because I looked a little like you as a lad..." the Watcher said, "Not that a mind at all...gorgeous woman, she is..."  
  
"Oh, yes, that I will drink to..." Zachary said, pulling out his flask of red liquid that he quickly mixed with some alcohol. A gulp later, it was gone. "A beautiful woman...but a real nag to live with..."  
  
"Indeed..." Giles agreed with a drunken nod, "Always raggin' on me to get her to someplace nice...huh..."  
  
"Yeah."  
  
"Great legs..."  
  
"Indeed."  
  
"And a nice ass..."  
  
Zachary just smiled.  
  
"Good in bed as well, eh?" the former librarian asked with a drunken smirk.  
  
"I'm a married man, Rupert..." Zachary warned with mock severity, "Happily married...totally in love with my wife...but I won't lie and say she wasn't amazing."  
  
"Cheers to it!" Giles cried, raising his glass. Zachary, with a smile, clinked his nearly empty glass against the Watcher's half-full one.  
  
"Right oh, my good man..."  
  
"Right!"  
  
"But I think, as much fun as this was..." Simms said with another grin, "we should stop now and get home..."  
  
"Whu?" the Watcher asked in disappointment, "But I want to try the little blue bottle! It looks interesting..."  
  
"And I'm sure it is, Rup..." Zachary said as he started to drag the drunken man out of the seat he was in. It was times like this that he was glad to be a vampire. The strength was a great help. "You should be glad I'm what I am...a very nice person, or I could've just left you here."  
  
"Oh, thankyou..." Giles answered as Zachary got him to his car, "What a polite vampire...wish we had more like you. 'Can I end the world please' or somesuch..."  
  
Zachary rolled his eyes. He remembered doing this as a human. It was fun to be the drunk one, but often times just as fun to be the sober one. As he put the Watcher into his car, Zachary decided to mess with him a little.  
  
"So did I tell you that I not actually a vampire, but an evil alien planning to arrange cows in circles and mutilate crops, right?"  
  
##  
  
Giles woke up the next afternoon with a bad headache, the same clothes he'd had on the night before, and a very weird memory. But he also ended up with a card in his pocket, which read "Sunset Consultants".   
  
"Well, I'll have to visit there and ask about that book..." Giles murmured as he made his way to the shower. For some reason, all he could remember was a view of himself as a young man, the fact that someone from that consultant company had his book, and a little blue bottle of alcohol. Mostly, he remembered the alcohol. Its rather hard to forget when it's pounding into your brain.  
  
"Indeed..." he said again as he undressed and stepped into the shower, "I'll go tonight...once this raging headache stops and I can drive again. And I'll get that book for Willow..."  
  
The End  
  
Send all feedback to HuffPuff1228@yahoo.com/  



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